Dr. Caitlyn Glick had a plan.
Finish vet school and go right into general practice.
“I always had a love for animals and growing up I couldn’t imagine a different career,” Glick said.
A career in veterinary medicine yes, but an internal medicine specialist – not so much. But her work as a fourth-year student in internal medicine was so impressive that she was awarded the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine Certificate of Clinical Excellence.
“I fell in love with internal medicine during our clinical year at Iowa State,” Glick said.
Still she needed a little push to tackle internal medicine full-time.
My friend and classmate, Kim Bebar, was the one who pushed me to pursue my passion of internal medicine,” Glick said. “Without her push, I don’t know that I would be where I am today.”
Today Glick is a staff veterinarian in internal medicine at the VCA Animal Care Center of Sonoma County in the San Francisco area. She joined the specialty and emergency hospital in 2015 after completing, first a rotating internship, followed by an internal medicine internship and finally a three-year internal medicine residency, all in New York.
In her job, Glick is responsible for receiving transfers from the hospital’s ER service, taking care of hospitalized patients in addition to seeing appointments and performing procedures – everything from routine diagnostic procedures to endoscopies and bronchoalveolar lavages.
“Being in internal medicine, I do enjoy being able to perform advanced diagnostics that I never thought I would be doing,” Glick said. “I have always been the type that likes to put all of the pieces together which is perfect for working in internal medicine.”
She’s also passionate about internal medicine and the results that come from a proper diagnosis such as removing a gastric foreign body from a patient with endoscopy rather than sending them for a surgical procedure.
“I also frequently have very sick patients hospitalized and it is wonderful when they are well enough to go home and rejoin their families,” she said.
But it’s not just dogs and cats at the VCA Animal Care Center of Sonoma County. The hospital works with a local wild animal park and zoo and Glick has had the opportunity to work on other four-legged creatures.
“I have been able to do ultrasounds on an African lion and a monkey in addition to doing an endoscopy procedure on a serval,” Glick said. “It’s always exciting to receive phone calls from them asking if they can bring animals to us!
“The entire staff loves it!”
Including it seems Dr. Caitlyn Glick.